we didn’t go very far because i still am a snot head. (meaning i have a cold, not that i’m lacking manners)

it had rained all morning, so the ground was covered with soggy leaves and puddles. cold damp air is foreign to my lungs; it was a nice change of pace. fresh mossy smells, not the dusty trails of home.

we only saw squirrels and one bird. no exciting wildlife, but there was a variety of mosses and lichens which i won’t see for a while.

our walk was through a pine forest. the rows were so orderly, i had to ask who planted them. a product of president roosevelt’s ccc, these pine forests were planted all over as a reforestation project meant to employ americans and conserve the forests. 3 billion trees were planted in 9 years.

it is a gloomy evening, but soon company will arive so we had better get a second wind. i napped after our trek, so that will help….

keep in mind i STILLLLL don’t have a macro. sigh. anyway. regarding the bees. it has been over a month since the agapostemons were discovered aggragating on a branch in my back yard…

a few weeks ago i began seeing a decrease in their numbers, and naturally i was very maudlin about this. these tiny bees, each one about the size of a piece of rice, we a big fixture in our back yard.

i knew the night i had discovered them, i had found something special. but i became more aware of how special it was, as the bees kept returning and of all the thousands and thousands of tree branches in my yard, each night they were on the same branch in the middle of my yard.

twice i have had to fish one out of my shirt after a late night photo shoot. they are, after all, male bees. i need to find out from buzzybeegirl just how long these native bees live. because i’m suspecting that after over a month, these aren’t the same individual bees that started this continuous slumber party.

the bees well after sunset. it’s quite dark. they sort of trickle in, and by 11:30 p.m. there is usually a mass of them. weeks ago there could be several hundered at a time, then it trickled down to 8ish. now, for the last week, there have been about 30 to 50 of these tiny native bees. by 5:30 they are sound asleep and not crawling all over eachother like they were the night before. they awake and start stirring. one by one they fly away. fast fliers, as well.

this morning many of the bees were here as late as 7. it was the latest i’ve seen them sleep in. i’m wondering if the cooler nights are making it harder for them to get going in the morning.

….it is 7:32. i just checked. there are two agapostemons still on the branch. they are stretching their antennae, then the will move about on the branch a little, then they will zoom away….

the power shot is on the ready for any cool bugs or cute dogs. so….here is the shell of a locust outside our office front door:

when i was a kid we moved into this boring house that had the coolest tree. i would climb it every day and i loved it. loved it. then, one morning i went to climb that tree and there were about ten of those locust shells…

and i completely freaked out. i never NEVER never climbed that tree again. and now? now i’m like “yaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!”

so, in case you don’t know how to take clear close ups with your power shot point and shoot camera because you find auto-focus does’t work up close:

you set your powershot to MANUAL on the dial, then you press the “flower” icon on the menu selection on your screen. then physically move the camera to the focus you want, press the button and center the little green digital box on your subject and CLICK!

6. and gillian, who somehow lucked out with lavender, but didn’t dodge my list bullet!

oh, and here’s the graphic:

i…i have no idea what it says, but i’m sure it’s a curse from my evil coworker. and instead of wishing me well….it is casting a spell that i will choke on a bonzai tree. that’s how we roll in our techy-hood.